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| Electricity (Home)
This is the biggest part of a personal project to reduce our electric bill. As of around April 2008, it is down to $15-$20/month. Keep in mind that we are living very close to the way we were with a $250/mo. electric bill.
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Oh Yeah - The Clothes Line
Yes, I highly recommend using a clothes line. This simple device saves so much energy it's a shame to use the drier. On the other hand, I do still use hot water to wash my clothes. Otherwise I smell funny (thank you for the people that let me know...;-). I just figured I had to "throw out" the clothes.
Seriously, each load of drying contributes 5-6KWH to your bill. In CT This is $1-$1.75. If you want to do "one thing", do this. In comparison, today I cooked a couple of times, surfed the web way too many hours, sat around with lights on, ran a load of wash (hot water), took a long hot shower, watched TV...and it added up to around 2KWH. The drier would have brought it up to 7-8KHW.
(Posted 4/19/2008 by admin) |
Fish Filter and Toothbrush Charger
Ok, these are things that I have a hard time giving up. Yes, with a $15 electric bill, I use an electric toothbrush and have an aquarium. The simple fact is that these use so little. Most houses waste more energy powering things like doorbells.
Regardless, I try to shut them off periodically. The toothbrush runs down and I charge it up. I also change the water a little more often in the aquarium.
(Posted 4/18/2008 by admin) |
Clean Energy Options
I almost forget that we signed up for the clean energy options program which increases our electric bill by about 2.5%. This claims to replace all of the energy with clean wind and hydro electric energy. It is nothing financially, and gives the right message to the market. In our case now, it amounts to 50 cents per month. With a $250 electric bill, it was $6.25/mo. Any of the changes listed below could easily make this back.
(Posted 4/18/2008 by admin) |
Obvious Things
Ok, so I haven't mentioned shutting off the computer at night, or energy efficient lightbulbs. The fact is that it is so easy and obvious. We were already doing that AND paying $250/mo. These changes all took us the rest of the way.
1) I use sleep mode on my laptop. This is nice because I just close the lid and it "shuts off". I open it, and everything is back where I left it.
2) We have all CFL lightbulbs. In our kitchen we switched to an energy star fixture that uses the circular bulbs. I guess it's more efficient, but not that big of a difference. We still need to change it to a warm bulb. It has that "clean white" feel that most people associate with offices. A warm bulb is all it needs.
3) We haven't really tried LED lights because they aren't that much different than CFL. On the other hand, I'm testing out solar, and it makes more sense there because CFL requires an inverter to generate 110V AC...while LED can run on 12V from the battery much better. (Note: there are 12V CFL bulbs, but they are somewhat rare.)
(Posted 4/18/2008 by admin) |
The Fridge - $10/mo.
Ok, this is the one area where I am sacrificing. We unplugged our fridge. Honestly, it was a nice energy efficient one, but we just don't know where to put it in the kitchen. We got too used to not having it there over the winter.
In the winter we simply used a cedar lined piece of furniture on our unheated porch. It was just a nice as any other fridge and used no energy. The porch stayed around 40 degrees the whole time - exactly the same as a normal fridge. The only bad time was late spring when it seemed to stop working over 1-2 weeks. We had a nasty cleanup day where we threw out a few days worth of food taking 1-2 hours.
On the other hand, it felt wonderful to be free of the big fridge...and I spent much more time trying to keep it clean anyway. Rotten food is something I seriously hate. I used to try to empty the fridge weekly and wash it as much as possible.
(Posted 4/18/2008 by admin) |
Internet Connection ($10)
We wired the internet devices (cable modem and wireless router) to a light switch. This way we're less likely to leave it running at night. Of course, this means that it's running when we just need light, or the lights are on when we just need internet from another room. But, so far it's prevented the accidental "internet on all night" mistake.
(Posted 4/18/2008 by admin) |
Computer Powerstrip ($10)
Here's another case where the tube monitor draws energy when it is turned off. We added a power strip to this old computer and simply needed to turn it on to use the computer. It saves 20 watts continuously.
Update: We have since replaced this machine with laptops. A running laptop (charging up its the attery and doing things) uses about 50-60 watts. The old computer uses about 250 watts. This is a nice upgrade.
Replacing the old TV will probably save more money in the same way.
(Posted 4/18/2008 by admin) |
Entertainment Center Power Strip
Would you believe that the TV draws 20 watts turned off? It draws another 50 watts turned on. This is crazy. We also found that our old DVD player didn't change how much energy it used if you turned it off. Wow! The power button didn't do anything.
Anyway, we added a powerstrip. Now we need to turn the TV on with two buttons. But, it saves close to 30+ watts.
(Posted 4/18/2008 by admin) |
Small Loads ($4/mo.)
There are a few small loads that seem to add up to another 10 watts. With these unplugged and the furnace off, the house draws nothing. A regular day where I cook a meal, surf the web, watch TV, and charge my cell phone merely adds up to <$1 per day. What is everyone else doing to use so much energy...?
Note: I leave my cell phone charger plugged in during the day. It's too minimal to notice.
(Posted 4/18/2008 by admin) |
Over Shut-off Switch ($2-5/mo.)
Our electric stove would always draw 10 watts. This was frustrating because it didn't seem to be doing anything. Eventually I added a $3 switch that disables the computer that manages the oven. Inside it turns out there was also a little screen that displayed the clock and timer. I was tempted to cut a hole to turn on these features that I didn't pay for. But simply added the switch and reduced our electric bill further.
(Posted 4/18/2008 by admin) |
Water Heater - $50/mo.
This may not seem like a big deal, but the TED helped us discover that the water heater was on a majority of the time. It basically had old thermostats that didn't like to work properly. Thus the water was always near 200 degrees.
I monkeyed with them for months (giving my 3 housemates cold showers occasionally), and eventually we replaced it.
I didn't like the cold showers, but I also didn't like the scalded hands. Now we have a furnace based water heater. Yes, we are burning gas, but it is much lower.
Note: The furnace has another one of those "transformers" that draws 10 watts. I shut it off as much as I can during the summer. Maybe someone sells a product that can automate this.
(Posted 4/18/2008 by admin) |
Doorbells - $5/mo. each (3x)
Soon after installing the TED, I wanted to get the "base load" of the house as low as possible. Somehow it always was running on 140 watts or more. This lead me to find 3 transformers running the doorbells, and one wasn't even running anything.
They draw roughly 10-20 watts each and step down the AC 110V voltage to run things like a doorbell. The key is that they run all the time regardless if someone is visiting.
It didn't take long to remove them, from now on friends will have to knock. (or call on their cell phones)
(Posted 4/18/2008 by admin) |
Motion Sensor Light - $20/mo.
Outside we were paying roughly $20/month to have lights on when we weren't home. I installed a motion light (that still doesn't aim right), and now it turns on when we walk by. One of these days I'll aim it better.
(Posted 4/18/2008 by admin) |
TED - The Energy Detective
I love this device. It cost roughly $150 and paid for itself in less than three months. Basically, it is just like the cheaper ($30) Kill-A-Watt. It measures the electricity that the whole house is using in real-time. It also tracks the usage so you can predict your electric bill.
Right away it showed places that we could save $50 per month. AND, we were already doing everything "right" with CFL light bulbs, etc.
(Posted 4/18/2008 by admin) |
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